


First, Second, Finally

by clumsygyrl (thegirlthatisclumsy)



Category: Popslash
Genre: Angst, M/M, Sparkly Dance Boys, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-10 16:11:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/468186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegirlthatisclumsy/pseuds/clumsygyrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>     JC hated white wine.  It seemed flighty and airy and not substantial somehow.  It was alcohol that didn't taste like it looked.  It lied.  Wine was supposed to be weighty and substantial.  It was supposed to be there, marking your tongue and mouth with an aftertaste and after tinge.  Wine was supposed to leave some sign it had been there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	First, Second, Finally

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own any of the members of *Nsync. This is a work of fiction. No harm meant. No money being made. No foul intended. Written for 's Oscar Wilde Challenge... link's at the bottom of the page.

_After the first glass, you see things as you wish they were._

     JC hated white wine. It seemed flighty and airy and not substantial somehow. It was alcohol that didn't taste like it looked. It lied. Wine was supposed to be weighty and substantial. It was supposed to be there, marking your tongue and mouth with an aftertaste and after tinge. Wine was supposed to leave some sign it had been there.

     "A toast to the soon to be Mr. Kelly Baldwin," Justin said topping off all the glasses with the bright amber yellow liquid. His perfect white smile brighter somehow from the alcohol. Reflective and harsh in its joy.

     JC tried not to flinch at Justin's sharp bark of laughter. It tinkled gratingly against his ears as the chorus of congratulations and cheers echoed and abounded. Made him think of jagged pieces of glass scraping underfoot. Broken beer bottles maybe against asphalt. Sounds that put teeth and nerves on edge. The volley of voices grated against over raw nerves making JC flinch again. He didn't look at Lance when he raised his glass. JC didn't want Lance to see the things in his eyes. Lance was the best liar. That part of their made up existence was true.

     Lance knew the signs of another liar.

     JC had learned to lie with his words and his smile. Something taught from years living the way he called his life, but he didn't lie half as well with his eyes. He smiled tightly and raised his glass to join in the chorus of crystal tinkling. The pictures of faces and bodies through the yellow bright bubbles of the Cristal, Hypnotiq, or whatever piss tasting white wine they were having.

     He'd rather see everyone through the champagne tint. It separated him from with a liquid shield.

     It was safer that way.

     It was easier to hide.

     Hide behind the hue of white wine tones and thinly spun crystal.

     Safer and easier.

     JC bit his lip and shifted against the plush leather seats of another VIP room in some other town. They all seemed the same. They all looked the same. They all smelled the same.

     Smelled of the acid rank stench of smoke and starfuckers. His eyes flicked around the loose circle at the faces that were familiar, but alien.

     "To Joey and Kelly!"

     JC tried not to flinch again. His glass raised again. He found Joey's face among the froth of white wine and Waterford glass. Joey looked bright and golden through the liquid window. He hung drunken arms around a bevy of girls. His eyes crinkled flashing the signature Fatone smile #56 around the circle. The smile stayed the same, but the girls were interchangeable.

     Red chick. Blue chick. Fat chick. Cool chick.

     Strobe lights and smoke coding them for Joey's to do list.

     He felt fingertips tap his shoulder. JC looked up startled and immediately wished he hadn't. Cool greens probed his naked blues.

     JC flinched and stared down, rolling the stem between his forefinger and thumb. He watched the mouth of the glass, spinning the liquid watching the bubbles chase after each other in a tornado game of Catch Me If You Can.

     He felt Lance's hand squeeze his shoulder with one hard sharp flex of muscle. Lance probably knew as well as he did how it felt to love and lose.

     JC lost Joey to Kelly.

     Lance had lost JC to Joey.

     JC flinched again when Lance's hand left his shoulder. He felt bruised. His whole body ached from outside in to the red bright skin of sunburn to the slow dull ache of want. He looked up at the sound of Joey's laugh. Someone was passing another glass of champagne in front of JC's face. He saw the smile and heard the laugh again through the tawny jeweled haze.

     White wine. White lies. Whitewine. Whitelies. Whitewinewhitelies.

 

* * * * *

 

     The first time they fucked had been a mistake.

     Or at least that's what Joey had stuttered the next morning hung over and contrite. No longer happybright from the German brew and no longer golden from the buzz of sex.

     They'd spent the night out on the town. Dusselburg or something else too hard to remember or to pronounce from memories Joey wanted to forget and JC tried to forget for him.

     He tried.

     Or at least that's what JC told himself. JC remembers the important things like the way Joey's skin had tasted like salt and smoke. He remembers the rough soft fingertips scrabbling against his ribs trying to tear at buttons and belt buckles. Kisses that tasted like cheap stout and Jagermeister and something inherently Joey.

     JC remembers everything important.

     He remembers the soft desperate 'I love you' when Joey comes.

     The morning after was awkward and pitted with silences that even years of friendship couldn't fill.

     Joey's voice filled the silence. He filled it with reasons why it had happened. Rationalized why it was normal. There were sentences decorated with words like 'experimenting', 'close bonds', and 'familiarity'. Words borrowed from Chris' psychological spiels and endless bus rides to places unknown. Joey talked to the floor and never to JC.

     JC watched the play of early morning light on Joey's stubble covered cheek. He remembers trying to listen, trying to agree with Joey's speech.

     He tried to agree.

     He tried to pay attention.

     JC remembers all the important things.

     He could never remember not to love Joey.

 

* * * * *

 

_After the second, you see things as they are not._

     Impending solo record releases, tv appearances, and L.A. glitter consume them both for days, weeks, and months. Somewhere outside the schedules it's turning into fall. A half lie in the sunbaked smog choked microcosm of Los Angeles. Months have past since the announcement.

     JC wanted to say that bitterness is new, but it's not. They've fallen into a pattern.

     The "they" no longer Joey and JC.

     They now meant JC and Lance. They tell the others it's for convenience, familiarity, and bonding. Something rang familiar in the explanation, but JC pushed it back. He pushed it away.

     The glass of red wine never made it past a few sips into JC's throat before Lance shoved him into the bedroom. Clothes found their way to the floor. Mouths and tongues pushed in a rough dance wanting needing something the other could provide. They never talked somehow knowing words would end the silent promise, the silent deal they'd forged. Fingers and mouths closer in intimacy then JC or Lance could seem to touch within the other.

     JC thrashed and hips rolled to meet the slow deep thrusting of Lance's. The blessed understanding of flesh and pleasure. Bodies knowing what they wanted even if the owners were scrambling for definition or guidance. The sounds and smells of sex echoed and permeated the room, rolling and coiling in the familiar pattern borne of nights of repetition.

     Lance grunted and JC's knows that's the sign to squeeze and roll. He mewled his impending climax.

     Lance grasped JC's slickwet cock in his hand and jerked him off so that they can come together.

     The harsh harmony of grunts of climax are the only words ever echoed in the quiet stillness. The heavy scent of sweat and autumn make the air almost tangible. The desperate battle between fall and summer somehow one can taste in the air. Summer dying and fall emerging from somewhere dark and light at the same time.

     JC's closed his eyes and he feels long fingered caresses on his skin wishing they were someone else's hands. Someone with hair darker and eyes softer than that of the cool blonde or ice green that look and touch him now. He knew it was fucked up. But he couldn't help wanting at times what he can't have.

     Lance rolled away on his side and away from JC. The silence was normal. Almost comforting in its familiarity. Almost. "Do you dream it's him fucking you or me?"

     JC pulled the sheet over him shivering.

     This was new. This was against the rule.

     "Can't you at least answer me that?"

     JC flinched and whispered. "I'm sorry." He dared to look up at Lance.

     The light in Lance's eyes died and were as cool and cold as only green can be. Lance has mastered the mask of indifference. Perfected for photoshoots and interviews, but never for the four of them.

     Never for JC.

     "Do you know who I see when we're fucking?" The slow thick cadence of his voice choking in its fake indifference.

     JC flinched not wanting to know the answer. Any of the options would hurt.

     "Do you even care?"

     JC's eyes slid up to Lance's and tried not to shiver at the ice there. "I care."

     "But not enough to be with me here?"

     JC's eyes close trying not to lie to Lance. He cared enough to spare Lance that. He wasn't that cruel.

     Lance sighed the sound tired and broken even to JC.

     "Who is it you see when we fuck?" JC whispered softly. The question posed more to the thin cotton sheet, shielding him, naked and vulnerable. It was safer somehow. It was easier not to look at Lance. He was the one cowering in bed, eyes closed, waiting for something, anything to happen. But he knew it was Lance that was the one raw and bleeding.

     Something suspended crystal bright in that moment. Waiting to shatter from whatever answer Lance wanted to fling at JC.

     "Not Joey."

     When JC opened his eyes, Lance was gone.

 

* * * * *

 

     It takes JC two days to work up the nerve to invite Lance to dinner. Even then it's only through a quick voicemail message on his phone.

     "I'm sorry." JC said swirling the red liquid in the glass. There were no bubbles to chase each other, just dark burgundy tones opening swallowing into a deeper black mouth.

     Lance's face gave nothing away. He reached for his glass of wine, drank, and continued eating.

     "Are you not going to even talk to me now?"

     Lance put down his fork and looked around the glittering room. Upscale, chichi, crème de la crème of who's who room of self important people. People like them who no longer cared. "We stopped talking years ago." The answer came soft, but the truth stung bitter swift.

     JC couldn't stop the flinch. He'd tried years ago to adopt the cool detached air Lance had mastered. He could never pull it off. He blinked and swallowed the cabernet. The mellow woodsy taste coating his tongue. The flavor of years of waiting in the dark aging and maturing bursting against taste buds, weighing them down with importance. "I know."

     The sigh is tired and sad. Broken in its delivery. "You know, there are times when I hate him and you both." Lance doesn't stop when JC's breath hitches. "I love you both. I loved him before. I know how easy it is to fall for him. Being in love with Joey is like being swallowed whole by sunlight." Laughed, a sound broken and bitter as the situation. "But it doesn't last. I loved him, but I love you now."

     "I know." This time JC's reply is sad and pained. The wine's aftertaste bitter and sour now.

     "I can't." Lance swallows. The mask has slipped and he can't keep it there. Never with the four of them. JC realizes that Lance never had the need to keep the mask in place before. Until now, when Lance should have kept himself safe. "I won't compete with his ghost. I'm too old and too tired to do it anymore."

     JC wanted to joke, to point out that Lance was too young to say stupid shit like that.

     But JC knew better.

     Lance had been aged, not in the dark and the comfort of shadows, but under the harsh light and equally harsh sharp cutting moments of their lives. JC swallowed and kept staring into the depths of his wine goblet. The answers aren't there. He knows that, but it doesn't stop him from wishing they were. "I do love you."

     "But it's not enough." Lance picked up his fork and pushed the overpriced overly small portions around the still pristinely white china. JC wonders when Lance stopped eating real food. When Lance started eating the perfectly made, perfectly positioned portions instead of the homemade imperfections. JC wonders when Lance had changed.

     JC wonders when he forgot to look at Lance.

     "Not anymore. Not for me."

     JC set his goblet down to placate, to reason, to keep Lance. The liquid ran blood dark rivulets down the side of the glass down his fingertips. The wine staining and marking the white linen of the tablecloth, marred now and no longer perfect. The wet stain with its color seeping and spreading out the wine claiming ownership like a wound freshly inflicted. Changing it. Scarring it.

     "No. I settled with everything else. I let space go. I let Joey go. I'm not doing it again." Lance whispered and again when JC looked up, Lance is gone.

 

* * * * *

 

_Finally, you see things as they really are, which is the most horrible thing in the world._

     "I'm sorry." Joey mumbles against sweat slick skin pushing himself inside.

     JC's fingers grip Joey's hip riding out the sensations, closing his eyes seeing bright sparks behind dark lids. Feeling love, feeling comfort in the smell and taste of Joey.

     It's not the second time after that first night. It's not even the third or fourth. The times and instances together have blurred in frequency and intensity. Over the years in between girlfriends on both sides, they fall into the pattern. They always come back to the same impasse.

     JC feels like every other relationship beyond Joey is just passing time till he's with Joey again. He thinks that it's the same for Joey.

     He hopes.

     Joey never promises.

     JC never asks. He's afraid to ask for something he knows that Joey can't give him.

     No matter how much JC wants it.

     "I'm sorry. I'msorry. I'msorrysorrysorry."

     The words burning their way into JC's mind. The words blend together in a mantra of pants and moaned between thrusts. The words are clear and pained.

     But all JC can hear is love.

     For a brief moment.

 

* * * * *

 

     "So, when did you find out?" The question is muttered in the dark. Whiskey rich and gravel toned in its intensity.

     "Five minutes before Kilborn." The reply came just as slow, both of them striving for detachment.

     JC swirled his glass and frowned. He wasn't in the habit of drinking stuff this hard. He was always teased for drinking pussy drinks. He didn't think right now it mattered. "You know he asked me to be Bri's godfather first?" He knew that the question would hurt Lance, but that hadn't been JC's intention.

     "I know." Lance said taking the glass from JC's hand and swallowing the contents, eyes intent and pitying. "You know I hated you back in Germany. You took Joey from me."

     "I know." JC answered staring out the dark window. Los Angeles. The City of Angels… lost ones. "He loved me."

     The unspoken acknowledgement of the past tense breathes through the room.

     "I know." Lance's voice was somehow hollow in the darkness. "Loved me too for awhile. I gave him up though."

     "Why?" When JC really wants to ask is how.

     "Because I didn't want him anymore."

     "Why?" This time the question is full of envy.

     "Wanted you." Lance flicked his eyes to JC's and then back down into the empty glass.

     The silent house became the set of some dark cosmic comedic gay tragedy. JC sighed and shook his head. "I…" JC didn't finish the sentence. Lance claimed the rest of the sentence with a hard kiss full of longing and love that makes JC cry in its purity. Silent tears wetting both their lips with salt.

     "You want to?"

     JC nodded. "I'll promise to try."

     Something shifts in Lance's expression. He pulls JC up from the chair. "I'll try to make you forget him."

     That's how it starts, and ends.

 

* * * * *

 

     Laughter rings out. Happy bright sounds cascade like the shower of sparkler bits. Flashing bright then dying into darkness only to be swallowed again and again by more of their brethren.

     Bright and continuous.  
     Sights and sounds of happiness.

     JC's glass is up again. Toasting to the happy couple. The head table is above the main floor. All eyes on the happy couple, as they exchange secret smiles and happy sounds. The crystal a cacophony of glass on glass almost deafening.

     Bright amber again. The room is cast in champagne tines and amber bright tones.

     Speeches made and toasts cheered.

     The bride and groom exchange smiles. Joey leans closer to Kelly smiling again.

     JC remembers something from years past.

     They've just landed in Orlando. Germany a not so distant memory, still fresh and raw in their minds. Pulsing just below the surface. Experiences and interludes etched in stark relief.

     JC watches Joey exchange hugs and welcome with family and friends. The exuberance and love overflowing overwhelming in its warmth. The center of a supernova of missed touches and shared laughter from a tight circle of arms and mouths. Mouths now moving in smiles and laughter.

     A voice calls from across the room. Something shifts in Joey's eyes. Something flickers in the dark brown depths.

     Kelly just waits at the fringe of the group, not family or friend, but other.

     Joey walks to her slowly, purposefully; he never ran to Kelly. He walks with a calculated measured step. Never in a hurry as if his feet knew that Kelly would always wait for him.

     Then he smiles.

     It's bittersweet in its intensity.

     Sweet for Kelly.  
     Bitter for JC.

     There's a sharp tang of something else.

     The memory fades and JC blinks watching the glittering smiles and eyes swirl and dance in celebration.

     Kelly leans into Joey. She always knew he'd be there in the end. On some level, Joey knew it too. He smiled down at her smoothing back dark curls in a gesture so familiar it makes JC's stomach clench. The gesture was familiar, but the look never his. The look was completely for Kelly.

     It's in that instant he realized that Joey loved him as much as he could. Gave with what he could, JC took what he could and hoarded the moments. Hoarded the love, till it was nothing but ash cold memories. Loved something that was never his wholly.

     JC swallows the light airy liquid again. Feeling the bubbles dissipate and disappear almost instantly. Joey was never his to claim. Knew that now.

     Knew it too late.

     He catches Joey's eye and meets the warm browns and in that moment wishes they were green.

     The sharp tang is still there, coating his tongue and throat in a metallic aftertaste. Blood is easy to identify rolling his tongue against the side of his cheek mixing the flavor with that of champagne.

     There's something else beneath the white wine and blood. The throat closing acrid taste almost makes JC choke.

     JC watches Kelly kiss Joey softly. JC's eyes connect with Lance's. Lance is at Joey's side. The best man, the confidant, and for a moment JC hates Lance.

     Lance raised his glass to JC. The amber liquid and crystal shielding his face and eyes. JC recognizes the final taste.

     "You okay C?" The question comes from somewhere to his right, the person doesn't matter. The question is dismissed as soon as it's spoken. Real answers aren't required.

     "Yeah. Fine."

     He swallows down more white lies and swirls it with the bitter aftertaste of regret.

 

 

__

After the first glass, you see things as you wish they were.  
After the second, you see things as they are not.  
Finally, you see things as they really are, which is the most horrible thing in the world.  


 

el fin

 

For **[Cherry's](http://precious.walkunafraid.org/ficindex.html)** \-- [Exquisite & Unsatisfied Challenge [An Oscar Wilde Quotes Challenge]](http://precious.walkunafraid.org/exquisite/)


End file.
